Method for Reconstructing Sparse Signals from Sign Measurements Using Greedy Search

ABSTRACT

A signal x is reconstructed from sparse sign measurements y. Estimated measurements {tilde over (y)} are obtained from a previous estimate  x   l-1  and a measurement matrix Φ according to {tilde over (y)} l =Φ  x   l-1 . A correction signal is applied to inconsistent measurements, so that consistent reconstruction can be performed.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This invention is generally related to reconstructing sparse signals, and in particular to reconstructing sparse signals from signs of signal measurements.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

To represent an arbitrary signal without error, it is well known that a signal must be measured at a rate that is at least twice the highest frequency (Nyquist rate). However, it is known certain signals can be compressed after measuring. It has been shown that measuring such signals and then compressing the signals wastes resources. Instead, compressive sensing can be used to efficiently acquire and reconstruct signals that are sparse or compressible. Compressive sensing leverages the structure of the signals to enable measuring at rates significantly lower than the Nyquist rate. Compressive sensing can use randomized, linear, non-adaptive measurements, followed by non-linear reconstruction using convex optimization, specifically, l₁ norm minimization, or using greedy searches.

Digital measurements of signals are quantized to a finite number of bits. e.g., only the most significant (sign) bit. However, reconstruction a signal from one bit measurements is difficult. One method combines the principle of consistent reconstruction with l₁ norm minimization on a unit sphere to reconstruct the signal.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Embodiments of the invention provide a method for reconstructing quantized signals by combining a greedy search with consistent reconstruction. At each iteration, the greedy search selects a locally optimal value to eventually determine a global optimum.

The invention processes linear measurements of a signal vector x using inner products with rows of a measurement matrix Φ. Each measurement is quantized to one sign bit in y.

y=sign(Φx),  (1)

where a function sign(y_(i))=y_(i)/|y_(i)| is applied element-wise to the measurements Φx, and the signal vector x is K-sparse, or compressible in a canonical basis. It is possible to embody the invention for signals that are sparse in another basis using x=Ba throughout the invention, where B is the matrix of the basis and a is the reconstructed vector of sparse coefficients that compose the signal using the basis matrix B.

The invention uses an iterative greedy search and consistent reconstruction, instead of l₁ norm minimization, as in the prior art. By combining the consistent reconstruction with the sparsity assumption, performance of the reconstruction of the spare signal can be significantly improved. The consistency is enforced with respect to the signs.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of pseudo code of method for reconstructing sparse signals from sign measurements according to embodiments of the invention;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of the method of FIG. 1; and

FIGS. 3-4 are schematic of vector and matrix operations that can be used by the method of FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

As shown in FIGS. 1-4, the embodiments of the invention provide an iterative method for reconstructing a signal vector x. The vector x is K-sparse in a canonical basis. By convention, the variable K indicates a largest number of non-zero elements. The reconstruction enforces a l₂ (Euclidean) norm.

After each iteration l, the method produces a current estimate x ^(l) of a reconstructed signal x, and its sparse support. In particular, we consider linear measurements of the signal x∈

^(N) using inner products with rows of a measurement matrix Φ∉

^(M×N). Each measurement is quantized to one bit by retaining only the sign bit in a measurement vector y. The steps of the method can be performed in a processor 200 including memory and I/O interfaces as known in the art.

Inputs-201: measurement vector y {±1} 300 of signs of the signal measurements Φx in a measurement matrix Φ 302, and a sparsity K.

Initialization 202: Iteration count l=0, and a current estimate x ⁰ 303 of the reconstructed signal x.

Step 1-210: While not converged do

Step 2-220: Increase iteration count l←l+1

Step 3-230: Estimate measurements {tilde over (y)} using the estimate of the reconstructed signal x ^(l-1) in the previous iteration.

In one embodiment, see FIG. 3, this is done according to {tilde over (y)}=diag(y)Φ x ^(l-1), where the function diag constructs a diagonal matrix 301 of the vector y. The estimated measurements are consistent when all elements of the measurements {tilde over (y)} are positive.

In a second embodiment, see FIG. 4, this is done according to {tilde over (y)}=Φ x ^(l-1). The estimated measurements are consistent when all elements of {tilde over (y)} have the same sign as the corresponding elements of the vector y.

FIG. 3 shows a diagonal matrix diag(y) 301 that contains the signs in the measurement vector y on the diagonal, and the measurement matrix Φ 302. In one embodiment, the estimate is {tilde over (y)}=diag(y)Φ x ^(l-1). FIG. 4 shown the second embodiment, where the diagonal matrix 301 is omitted.

Step 4-240: Identify sign inconsistencies in a vector r for measurements in the vector y that have signs inconsistent with the estimated measurements {tilde over (y)} 300, according to r^(l)=({tilde over (y)})⁻.

In the embodiment as shown in FIG. 3, the vector r only stores the negative elements ({tilde over (y)}^(l))⁻ of the output of step 3, where (.)⁻ indicates the negative elements of {tilde over (y)}, and all positive elements are set to zero.

In the second embodiment as shown in FIG. 4, the vector r stores the elements of the vector {tilde over (y)} that have opposite signs than the corresponding elements in the vector y, and sets all the elements with the same sign to zero.

Step 5-250: Determine a correction signal s according to s=Φ^(T) diag(y)r if the diagonal matrix is used in step 3, and according to s=Φ^(T)r if the diagonal matrix is not used. The correction signal s is used to make the signs in the estimated measurements {tilde over (y)} consistent.

Step 6-260: Identify support set for the correction signal s according to

T=supp(s ^(l)|_(L))Usupp( x ^(l-1)),

where supp(.) determines a support set, and (.)|_(L) selects L components of the correction signal s with largest magnitudes, and sets all other components to 0. The size L is a parameter of the method depending on the properties of the measurement matrix Φ. We prefer K<L≦2K. A smaller L can make the reconstruction much slower. A larger L can make the reconstruction less precise or reduce the probability that the method converges correctly.

Step 7-270: Perform consistent reconstruction on the support T using the following optimization:

b ^(l)|_(T)=arg min_(x)∥(diag(y)Φx)⁻∥₂ ², such that ∥x∥ ₂=1 and x| _(Tc)=0,

and set b ^(l)|_(Tc)=0,

where b^(l) is the result of the optimization, b^(l)|_(T) denotes the elements of b_(l) in the support set T, and b^(l)|_(Tc) denotes elements not in the support set. The notation ∥¹⁰⁸ ∥₂ denotes the l₂ norm, i.e., a total signal energy, and ∥•∥₂ ² denotes a square of the l₂ norm.

That is, the squared norm of the inconsistent part of the vector, subject to the normalization constraint, is minimized. The minimization can also be performed on the inconsistent part of the non-diagonal form Φx, similarly to the embodiment in FIG. 4.

Step 8-280: Truncate, normalize, and update correction according to

${\hat{x}}^{l} = {\frac{\left. b^{l} \right|_{K}}{{\left. b^{l} \right|_{K}}_{2}}.}$

Output-209: Reconstructed signal x ^(l).

Measurement Process

The measurement process only records the sign of measurement sign(Φx)=sign(Φαx), for all α>0, and discards the magnitude. Therefore, the amplitude constraint ∥b=∥₂=1 is imposed during the reconstruction, otherwise x=0 would be a consistent but undesirable solution. This is why the l₂ norm constraint is enforced by normalizing the signal after each iteration.

However, other methods and constraints can be used to normalize the signal. Examples include but are not limited to: normalizing the signal to have a pre-specified l₁ norm, normalizing the signal to have a pre-specified l_(∞) norm, scaling the signal such that a particular coefficient or a linear combination of the coefficients has a pre-specified value, or projecting the signal to a pre-specified plane.

EFFECT OF THE INVENTION

The invention provides a method for reconstructing sparse and compressible signals from signs of measurement of the signals, while enforcing a sign consistency constraint and a norm constraint. The method is greedy by selecting a local optimum at each iteration. The reconstruction method has several advantages over the prior art, which uses an l₁ norm minimization-based consistent reconstruction.

If the signal estimate i during the iterations becomes equal to the measured signal x, then the method is guaranteed to terminate with the correct solution. This is in contrast to the prior art, which provides no such guarantee.

Second, in contrast to prior art, the reconstruction always returns a sparse solution.

Third, in contrast to the prior art, the method does not rely on the l₁ norm to measure the sparsity of the reconstructed signal. Thus, the method can use the l₁ norm as a normalization constraint, instead of the l₂ norm. It is possible to modify the method so that the solution satisfies ∥ x∥₁=1.

Fourth, the method is more consistent and has better performance than the l₁ norm based method of the prior art.

The method significantly outperforms prior art methods that do not enforce sparsity and a norm constraint. At high bit rates, the gain can be 12 dB to 20 dB when compared to prior art reconstruction.

Although the invention has been described by way of examples of preferred embodiments, it is to be understood that various other adaptations and modifications can be made within the spirit and scope of the invention. Therefore, it is the object of the appended claims to cover all such variations and modifications as come within the true spirit and scope of the invention. 

1. A method for reconstructing a signal x from sign measurements y, wherein x ^(l) is a current estimate of the reconstructed signal x, comprising for each iteration l, until the current estimate convergences with a previous estimate x ^(l-1), the steps of: estimating measurements {tilde over (y)} using the previous estimate x ^(l-1) and a measurement matrix Φ according to {tilde over (y)}^(l)=Φ x ^(l-1); identifying, in a vector r, sign measurements y that have signs inconsistent with the estimated measurements {tilde over (y)}; determining a correction signal according to s=Φ^(T)r^(l); identifying a support set T^(l) for the correction signal s according to T ^(l)=supp(s ^(l)|_(2K))Usupp( x ^(l-1)), where supp(.) determines the support set T^(l), and (.)|_(2K) selects 2K components of the signal x with largest magnitudes, and setting all other components of the signal x to 0; performing consistent reconstruction according to b^(l)|_(T)=arg min_(x)∥Φx∥₂ ², such that ∥x∥2=1, and x|_(Tc)=0, wherein |_(T) denotes elements in the support set and |_(Tc) denotes elements not in the support set; and updating the current estimate x ^(l), wherein the estimating, identifying, determining, identifying, performing, and updating steps are performed in a computer system.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein the signal x is K-sparse in any basis.
 3. The method of claim 1, wherein the signal x is compressible.
 4. The method of claim 1, wherein the reconstruction enforces a l₂ norm.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the estimating step uses {tilde over (y)}^(l)=diag(y)Φ x ^(l-1), wherein the function diag constructs a diagonal matrix of the sign measurements y; and the determining step uses S=Φ^(T) diag(y)r.
 6. The method of claim 1, wherein the identifying step retains only negative elements ({tilde over (y)}^(l))⁻¹, and further comprising: setting all positive elements to zero. 